During an archaeological investigation within the 14th century tower at Maison Dieu, Dover, ahead of the construction of a lift shaft, a number of walls including some of a Medieval date were uncovered. Immediately beneath the flooring were six modern (Victorian?) sleeper walls consisting of mortar bonded brickwork. These were removed, along with the rubble layer upon which they were built, revealing three further walls. Two of these are of flint block bonded with lime mortar while the third is of roughly hewn sub-rectangular blocks of ragstone bonded with a modern (Victorian?) mortar. It is possible that one of these two earlier walls was constructed to externalise the colonnaded area to the west and form the antechamber on its eastern side. The proposed antechamber would have opened on to the 13th century archway between the central northern masonry pier of the tower and the west wall of the stair turret. Its massive construction (0.98m wide) suggests that it may have been load bearing and it is certainly represented as a structural wall on a plan of 1834 of the building. Its disappearance from later plans suggests that it may have been demolished in the mid-19th century during two phases of restoration. No independent dating evidence was recovered for these walls, they appear to post-date the masonry of the tower itself but the materials and mode of construction however suggest a Medieval date for their origin. (1)

<1> South Eastern Archaeological Services, 1994, Excavations at Dover Town Hall, Maison Dieu: An Interim Statement (Unpublished document). SKE6636.